The Strength of Nature
by BionicD0LPH1N
Summary: OC Worm fanfiction in which Liam joins the Wards and everything goes to hell from there. This is a tale of adventure and hardship, but there might be time to make friends along the way. ON HIATUS/DISCONTINUED (not sure yet)
1. Herbivorous 1,01

**Act 1: Herbivorous**

**1.01**

Today was not a good day. Earlier today, I managed to get denied and laughed at by my crush, get beaten up by some E88 gang members after school and now I was going to be punished by dad for being late.

Hurting everywhere, I entered my home and closed the door carefully, hoping to avoid my father's wrath. Unfortunately, that was not to be, as I heard footsteps tumbling down the stairs, drowning my hope of a peaceful evening.

My dad looked down on me. "Who do you think you are young man? Coming back home at ten? Ten! Do you have a death wish? You are going to regret this little escapade, boy!", Dad shouted in one breath, channelling all his might and fury in that last word, as if it was a poison he needed to spit out.

I tried to keep my head high. I really did. However, I only managed to mutter, my shin pointing at my feet and biting my dry lips: "Sorry dad. It won't happen again." I looked pathetic. I was pathetic.

I should stand up for myself, I knew it, and maybe it would lower the chance of a good beating by dad, but, how could I? I wasn't strong enough. I was weak.

"It won't happen again?", he said in a cold tone, looking at me in disgust as if I was a piece of gum stuck under his shoe. Guilt and dread ran trough me, making me wish I'd run from home and never came back. "I can't believe you keep giving me that crap. When I said back home directly after school, kid, don't tell me you didn't understand!"

"I was just hanging out with friends", I lied, hopping he wouldn't decipher my masquerade. As if I had any. Actually, I did, but they weren't the normal kind.

Anyway, even in the unlikely instance that he would believe me, it wouldn't stop the punishment I was going to receive. I really should've thought before blurting that out.

He didn't seem convinced at all. "I don't care, boy!" With a final tone to it, he took out his belt and said in a crisp voice the words I dreaded to hear: "In the TV room. Now! And don't make my say it again."

* * *

After a less than fun time the TV room – 'more like torture chamber', I thought sourly –, I realized with the bruises on my left leg that he hit me quite harder than normally. I wouldn't say he went harder than the gang members that jumped me earlier, but the pain I felt right now? All dad.

I crawled on my bed, scary thoughts making the pathetic pile of garbage I called my body shiver. I wanted to sleep, so, so much. But I couldn't. The animals at the zoo needed help, and I was the only person that could give it. My muscles aching, I stood up reluctantly, and made my way towards the showers.

Entering the bathroom, I saw a familiar sight in the corner of my eyes. For a fraction of a second, I couldn't believe the reck in front of me was myself. I was a complete mess. My face looked sickly, with heavy bags under my small brown eyes. My black hair was tangled like the brush of an old broom, and my nose was had a huge, disgusting pimple on the left side, making me look like a witch. I had high cheekbones, which were generally associated with beauty. Today though, I just looked like one of those monstrous capes. I frowned as I saw my whole body in shambles, with the countless bruises, gift received directly from both my dad and E88 dumbasses near school.

I took a quick and cold shower, hoping that the icy water would freeze the pain I felt everywhere. Once I got out of the minuscule cubicle, I quietly entered back into my room, hoping I wouldn't wake up my choleric dad. My bed would feel heavenly right now, but I had to do the mission I promised myself I would do.

Earlier this month, a young chimpanzee died at a zoo from an illness no one managed to diagnose. The veterinarian, coming only once a month because of the lack of fonds, didn't catch any of it, and at night, when no one was there, the lonely monkey went into a deep sleep that he never woke from. I knew most employees, like Jerome and Penelope, found it idiotic that anyone would be sad or would blame themselves for the death of a simple chimpanzee that 'looked like any other'. I knew that this wasn't the case.

Champ was one of my best friends for months. He was a loving chimp, always bubbling with excitement, and with a very big appetite that couldn't be satiated.

His death had been a torture to me. I should have seen it. I should've seen that something was wrong. If I had gone at the zoo at night, like I did nowadays, I could have noticed the problem and cured him.

That terrible day he died, I promised myself that there would always be someone to look after the Brockton Bay Zoo animals in their times of need.

My thoughts still elsewhere, I put on my black hoody, opened the window quietly, jumped down on the bush under the window and hoped with all my heart that my drunk dad wouldn't be alerted by my escape.

* * *

Finally arrived at the zoo, the all-powerful moon was beaming in the night's sky, and I couldn't help but shudder at the cold March breeze running in the trees. The darkness coupled with the winter air and with the singing trees made it an eerie scene. The dark building in front of me was small with only one floor, and even though the architecture itself was unremarkable, it was like a second home to me. It was even where I slept most nights nowadays. I entered swiftly by the employee door on the side of the famous Brockton Bay Zoo.

After entering in the warmth of the employee's block, I opened the light and looked around.

The place was completely devoid of life, which was predictable at 11 o'clock. To my left down the corridor was the boss' office, and just further was the lunch place for the employees, where we took our pauses. To my right, there was a huge room with a lot of miscellaneous items that we used to do our job.

I walked past the short corridor into the lunchroom and went directly outside again through the back door. There was a trail going around the zoo passing by the snakes' cages, then by the feline section where the lions, tigers and other savanna felines stayed, then by the gorilla section where Gary and Manny lived, our resident gorillas, and then the trail came back in a loop after having crossed other minor entertainment sections. The zoo was not particularly big in area but contained more animals than most zoos on the East coast.

Some people – who are wrong – would call me a workaholic for going every night at the zoo to look for the animals. I'm not a workaholic, I'm just passionate, that's all. What's the saying? 'It's not work if you like it'?

My body was on autopilot as my thoughts brought me to the entrance of the gorilla section to see if Gary and Manny needed company. I slowly opened the creaky door of the somber cage, as I did every night, and peered trough the entrance to see the two magnificent gorillas resting on the rocky terrain.

My thoughts took a dark turn. I was distracted as I remembered the disappointment my dad was showing me when he glowered at me today, the stupid insults the dunderheads at school threw my way during gym class, and the beating I had after school that retarded my return home, which in turn continued the cycle of bruises and suffering.

"This is for looking at me when I didn't give you permission", the older Winslow student shouted as he kicked me again in the ribs. "And this is for being a worthless piece of shit", he said in the same angry tone. He then managed with help from another E88 gang member to stick me to a post and left me there.

'Why me?', I couldn't help but asking myself rhetorically. Was it because I was not in their stupid gang? Because I didn't fight back? Because I really was worthless and needed to see my place in the world? That was surely what everyone thought.

After their embarrassing rodeo, an elderly woman had to save me, as pathetic as that sounded, and I thanked her profusely.

But despite all that embarrassment, the worst part of my day was when I asked the most amazing girl in school to go out with me. The dark-skinned athletic girl simply answered: "I don't go out with victims", and she gritted her teeth.

She thought I was a victim. I guess I was, wasn't I? I needed to keep on fighting – figuratively, of course – and become the best I could be.

The gorillas looked so peaceful then, so free even in their eternal prison, that I couldn't help but hope I was like them, just this once. That would make everything so much _easier_. No more bullying, no more of this stupid city, no more of my terrible dad, not more of everything horrible that ever happened to me. Just living the present, getting looked by people that loved their jobs.

People didn't like me, but animals did. The problem was that I couldn't connect with them. Sure, they could hear me, but really understand, sympathise, talk back? Hell no.

When I came back to myself, the biggest gorilla – Gary – was looking down at me. Close, too close. He looked strangely hostile, almost threatening, which was not habitual for him. He growled at me, and I never had so little hope in my whole life. 'If only I could be like you, Gary, if only', I thought, and the huge and strong beast started to advance on me. I was going to die. I was going to die. I was going to die.

I took two steps back, but the fence stopped me from taking a third. He leaped towards me, and his strong grip crushed my already suffering arm. He then hit me once. The last thought I had before everything went black was: 'If only…'

When Liam would wake up, the dreams of nigh-invincible gods would fade away from his mind like a flower in winter.

* * *

I woke up suddenly and memories of the previous night flooded in my mind. I was dead. I had to be. The last memories I had was of me getting trampled by an angry gorilla.

I opened my eyes and looked around, blinking at the luminous sky. The sun was bright, warming me as if it was a bright summer day. Fence, metal door, section C3… I was still in the big gorilla section! Did that mean I was still alive? Looking more carefully around, I could see the gorilla couple, peacefully resting on the rocky terrain a few meters from me.

The first thing I realized was that, as I turned my head left and right, my movements felt awkward, as if my muscles were stiff in my neck. Torticollis maybe? Then, I realized that my whole body felt wrong. Not as if I was sprained in some places, or not even as if my body was riddled with bruises. No, strangely, the pain was mild compared to the previous night. Had I been knocked out longer than expected? My muscles felt bigger, stronger and I felt unstoppable. When I looked down, I realized what was wrong.

All the subtle hints came back into place like in a jigsaw puzzle. The stiff neck, the strong muscles, and the weird smells I could pick up. I saw my body as the one of a big and hairy gorilla.

As the second puzzle came into place, I realized that I, Liam Howells, was a parahuman.


	2. Herbivorous 1,02

**1.02**

I had a big problem. I'd probably be able to change back into my human form, but I was scared that a tourist would see me while transforming. That would be unfortunate. Day one, and with it gone any secret identity. I might have to wait the whole day to be able to transform alone at night.

"And this is our two amazing gorillas", said the zoo guide, followed by a group of tourists that looked bored. "Uhm…Actually there is three today, I guess." He started counting down ridiculous facts about gorillas to an unresponsive audience.

"Do you think 5 people could beat one gorilla in a fight?", asked a ludicrously adorable kid to the blond guide, which I could now place as Jerome.

"Probably not", he answered, uncertain. "It's hard to say how hard they really hit, because they generally are very peaceful, but when they get mad nothing short of a wall can stop them. I wouldn't recommend trying, that's for sure." He ended the sentence with a wry grin. The terrible joke fell flat.

What I realized then was that, when the feeders would bring the food, in a few minutes, they'd realize that something was wrong in the number of gorillas in here. I couldn't get caught, because that would mean that they would check with their boss, then possibly the cameras, which would mean Game Over for me. I had to leave immediately, but if I changed back into my human form, it wouldn't be any easier to leave. Even worse, Gary, the gorilla that sent me to sleep last night, could start hitting me again.

The problem was that people had seen me, a guide had counted the gorillas and tourists were still watching me. There was a small tree in the furthest corner from the entrance, and I might be able to get under it to get a bit of privacy.

Wait a second. Was my power just to be able to turn into a gorilla? That really felt irrelevant. A brute 1, max? I couldn't believe it.

The thing was, I couldn't really test it, could I? I was trapped here, waiting patiently for employees to find me, and ponder on why a gorilla had appeared today. The only good thing going on for me was the date. With it being a Friday, I wouldn't be punished again by Dad for missing school.

Maybe my gorilla form had other powers? Maybe I could send lasers or something? Or… maybe I was stuck like this forever? I had to check. I got behind the tree's trunk, crossing my big fingers that something would happen.

I closed my eyes, thinking of my own body, and suddenly… I was myself again. That was a huge relief.

But really, what could I do? Maybe I could change into other animals? As that question crossed my mind, the door at the other side of the gorilla section started creaking. Shit. I had to decide quickly. Should I change back into a gorilla again, or should I try changing into something else? Weirdly, I had the feeling that I could do so much more, that I could change into millions of different things, and that they were all in front of me like the pages of a book. It felt like I just needed to _choose_ the right one. _Bird_, I thought as hard as I could.

I felt myself getting smaller and smaller, and the world got larger and larger, until I was insignificant next to huge rocks and leaves the size of beds. I looked from side to side with a vision better than my own and saw big black wings. They were majestic, and a rush of adrenaline entered my system as I spread them. I started flapping my wings, and they lifted me towards the sky. I was a nondescript crow, and I couldn't help but realize how easy and exhilarating it was to fly. The ground was getting farther and farther away with each movement, and the tiny zoo employees walking down the street felt like an entire world away.

My power was awesome.

* * *

The same weekend, I experimented a bit with my power. I found a small empty warehouse at the Docks, and it was tall enough to sustain any animal short of a giraffe or an elephant. The first animals I tried were cats and dogs. It worked well, and after having tried some more animals from the zoo like a lion – I roared, obviously, by virtue of curiosity –, a zebra and a tiger, I was pretty sure my power was basically letting me change into any animal.

I tried to transform into a liger, the rare mix between lion and tiger, and then a mule, but in both cases my power could not handle it. I tried as well to transform into a T-rex, and then a velociraptor, because that would really be awesome, but to my great shame it came out blank. My third idea was to try transforming into recently extinct species, like the Neanderthal, which, again, kept me human.

I tried to remember multiple species of tigers, and to my delight, I could feel the small changes in my body between them. That, at least, would give me quite the pool to choose from, which amounted to about 2 million animal species in total on earth, according to a magazine I'd read.

Finally, I tried to change as fast as I could between lion and tiger, and to be honest, I wasn't disappointed. The change was very fast, about a tenth of a second when I concentrated, and I had an almost intuitive understanding of each animal's strange senses and limbs. I could jump, transform into a koala and then a chameleon, change my color and land.

After all the hype of a new amazing power had calmed down, I realized something: my power was pretty cool and all, but in a fight? Not so much. Imagine a bear going against Alexandria. Or a pig going after the almighty Lung. In that case, I'd probably just end up as bacon for his next breakfast. Would that even be cannibalism?

I couldn't get the image of Lung laughing down on a pig running around with its tail on fire. The thought made me shiver.

Would they even accept me into the Wards, with my horrendous power? Would they flat out refuse me? That would probably be a first.

Sure, a gorilla could be counted as a brute 1, maybe, and my birds could be low mover powers, but could a dog beat any type of Parahumans in a fight? Lung? Burned like the Amazon forest. Oni Lee? Blown out of this world. Kaiser? Get cut to ribbons. Literally any Parahuman? I'd get destroyed, probably even by L33t.

Even fighting nonpowered people wouldn't be too easy either.

My power was awful.

* * *

The next day, I was back to Winslow High-school, with the same boring Mr. G, spouting his nonsense. We had to present a project about interesting capes that changed the world in good or in bad ways. Most students picked Protectorate heroes, and some four lucky winners got to choose Legend, Alexandria and Eidolon. And Hero.

The cape I chose was Herd, an eco-villain, like he called himself, that freed animals in factories and took care of them. His power had to do with mastering falcons and dogs, and probably had a part to do with duplication, from what I'd researched. The stories I heard from his power were of heroes getting trampled by dozens of trained falcons, all synchronised to attack at the same time. I was a big fan of what he did with his team, because the fellow animal-lover risked money and sometimes himself to go out there and give a better life to helpless farm animals. The only reasons why he was a villain was because he would steal the animals, but he never hurt anyone. Except maybe financially. With the rest of Philofaun, his team, he probably did good overall for the world.

After the previous student presented about the wonders of Legend, I stood up and went in front of the class. I wasn't nervous about forgetting anything. No, I could probably have presented while sleeping. However, I was terrified of being ridiculed for my opinions, and at that moment, I hoped I could have gotten a Stranger power that simply made my body disappear.

I did well all in all, or so I thought, until Mr. G asked me after my presentation: "So do you _really_ think that this delusional terrorist is really doing good?", he rhetorically asked. "Don't you see? Him and his lunatics destroy _human_ lives!", he said, putting the emphasis on 'human'. "It's not supposed to be so complicated: Villains are evil, and heroes are good – everyone knows that", he said as if I was the dumbest moron in the whole world.

That was just rude. I kept staring in disbelief at his very hittable face. I tried taking deep, slow breaths to calm myself down, but all I managed to accomplish was to flush. After a few seconds, my regular medium skin returned to its original color and I answered: "As I said during the presentation, when you look deeper into it, the world is not as black and white as you might think. Actually…", I trailed off as he cut me abruptly.

He started in an immensely patronizing tone: "Yes, yes, there is shades of grey and all that. I've heard this story so many times, but it's still as ridiculous as the first time around. Listen, if Herd was a remotely good guy, he'd try to manifest openly and argue his opinions. Instead, he strolls from slaughterhouse to slaughterhouse and steals from humans, increases the price of meat all over the East coast, and saves animals that will be replaced the next day anyway." He took a deep breath, and continued, "You should probably research better before spouting that nonsense". People snickered all around the classroom.

He couldn't say that! He just couldn't! This was probably the first time he heard from Philofaun in his whole life, and the spiteful man-child thought he knew everything about them! Philofaun was all about saving animals. They always tried not to affect humans too much, and they even paid back the price of animals they stole! They were literally just bought the animals alive instead of dead! The bought them f_orcefully_, I didn't add mentally.

I was seeing red, my heart was pounding in my throat, as I ambled back to my desk.

* * *

Right jab, cross, hook, uppercut. It would be so easy for me to knock them down a peg or two, even more now that I had my power. But of course, I had to be a coward.

"Are you going to cry?", my very unoriginal tormenter taunted me, as he pushed me to the ground, closely followed by his two pawns.

We were in a medium-sized street, in which they caught me walking back from school. The street was empty, except for an old lady making a call from her phone. 'Please call for help, please call for help', I thought. I didn't know what to do. I just couldn't get back up. I didn't have the normal fight or flight. All I had was the third 'F', better known as 'freeze'. However, that didn't mean that I didn't know _how_ to fight.

I learned to fight from Dad. Sometimes, he'd come back from his pitiful work, and he'd teach me to fight. Dad wasn't a good father, but at least he'd thought me how to defend myself.

However, they were three, and I couldn't bring myself to fight back. I just didn't want to feel my knuckles against their bare face, I didn't want to feel my boot in their flank. All I could do was wait anxiously to know if I'd get mugged.

Today, however, was my lucky day, because about a minute into the tormenting, a shadow came down from the sky like an avenging angel. My savior was tall for a girl, and was dressed in a heavy black skin-tight cloak, with a black painted metal mask hiding her identity. She was swift in the movements, kicking in the knee the first as she elbowed the second on the nose. Said nose started to bleed profusely, as the third guy accumulated all his survival instincts and started running into the dark alley.

The two other guys were quickly driven to run as well, and she turned towards me, still panting. "You really are pathetic, aren't you?", the girl I recognised as Shadow Stalker asked rhetorically.

"Thanks", I said awkwardly at the rescue and subsequent insult. "That was awesome", I added stupidly.

"Victim", I heard her mumble as she walked of, crisply turning on her heels.

As I watched her stalk away, I couldn't help but wonder what the hell had just happened.

* * *

That night, I thought a lot about my power, Shadow Stalker and the Wards in general. Would I be good in the Wards' team? Should I stay independent? On the plus hand, the Ward program would help me 'experience my power in a safe way', or so they said on their website. Everyone knew that Wards didn't only practice safely after school together – they had to fight dangerous Villains, and often it didn't end up as sunshine and rainbows. People got hurt and even died all the time in the Wards' team. However, staying independent would be probably dangerous by itself. Without practicing my power, how was I supposed to defend myself when the stereotypical evil Supervillains came in town? Also, I had an awesome opportunity to finally make a difference in this city. Why waste it?

Of course, villainy was out of the question. I couldn't hurt people and wanted it even less. I just couldn't fit into the stereotypical Villain that stole banks for personal gain, or that took over cities. Hurting someone wasn't on my to-do list, and even if I could respect Herd actions for animal's rights, I would never join them. Would the Ward team be good for me? Would they want me? Would they just say: 'Sorry, but after diligent consideration, we realized that your power sucked, so… bye! Have a lonely day!'? Or would I learn to get as badass as Shadow Stalker, as strong as Aegis and as powerful as Armsmaster?

With a million question still whirling through my mind, I made my decision. Next Friday, I would go to the Brockton Bay PRT ENE Headquarters, and I would ask to join the Wards' team. If they refused, then so be it, I'd stay independent. If they accepted me, then maybe I'd get to practice my powers, and more importantly: I'd be a hero.

Because wasn't that what I really wanted? I wanted to protect people like myself from being beaten up by random gangs in the city. I couldn't stand them, especially Empire 88. And, if I made friends along the way, it wouldn't be too bad either.

Hero. Wouldn't that be the best job in the world?


	3. Herbivorous 1,03

**1.03**

The following few days were strangely dull. I'd wake up, get out towards school in the lukewarm March weather, then come to classes, almost always ending up sleeping, and I'd come back home and then went to the zoo at night. That didn't give me the required 8 hours of sleep at night, barely even half of it. My grades were showing, and I belatedly realized that I couldn't keep that pace.

To get to school I would try out all kind of regional birds, to see which ones were the fastest – or let's be honest here, the coolest. I tried a lot of them, but in the end, the ones that stuck were the golden eagle, the fastest horizontal flyer I found, and the hummingbirds. All hummingbirds were awesome, but especially the smaller ones. I could feel my heart literally pounding a thousand times a minute, my wings beating 3000 times a minute, and I learned quite quickly to do little in-flight loops. It's not well known, but hummingbirds can fly upside-down.

Friday, instead of going to work at the zoo right after school, I went to the PRT ENE HQ. Step one of being a hero. I had concocted an old disgusting costume made from my dad's black ski leotards and a very suspicious balaclava. My attire was really catching the eye, getting countless looks from people wondering what I would steal. Because yeah, I totally looked like the stereotypical burglar.

After an interminable bus ride that brought me all the way from the Docks to Downtown, I entered the large futuristic PRT building by the front doors. My hands were slightly shaking, and I crossed my fingers, hoping that I wouldn't be foamed, or worse, simply shot down before my first cape fight. Or ridiculed. Or denied. That could happen as well.

Going through the entrance, I realized they had closed the automatic doors behind me and had not opened the front ones. I then heard a serious voice call out, "Who are you and why are you here?"

"Uhm, hi. I'm a Parahuman and I was wondering if I could join the Wards", I said promptly. "How can I meet with Director Piggot?" I really should have prepared something less amateurish. I was shaking internally, wondering if the guy would just laugh right to my face and let me stay locked in here. I was starting to feel claustrophobic.

"Have you contacted the PRT?", he asked gently. I shook my head, looking down at my feet. "Are you daft young man? Have you ever heard of a cell phone? Of appointments?" He had a tone that said clearly 'what an imbecile'. I knew I'd get ridiculed. "You can't just stroll in and expect the Director of the PRT to meet you without any premade appointment! She's a busy woman!", the voice all but shouted in a crescendo of anger. He continued after a few seconds, calmer, having realized I was still agape from his rant, "I'll message her. It's not everyday we get new potential Parahuman soldiers…uhm, helpers, I mean, Wards. Sit in the waiting room in front of you to the left and Director Piggot might call you to her office in a few minutes. Or hours more likely."

With my brain catching up, I realized that my stupidity had indeed reached new frontiers. I obviously should've called, made an appointment and sent details beforehand. The Director of the local PRT was probably a very busy woman, and I couldn't expect her to be on standby to meet any 16 years old teenagers that showed up.

I generally wasn't stupid. I had very good grades at school in the subjects I cared for, like in Art and in World Issues, but in the subjects I didn't care for, like Math and Computers, I couldn't for the life of me deign to study. That in turn gave me average grades, which my dad would punish me for. Overall, I didn't think I was stupid, I just did a lot of stupid stuff. But wasn't that what being stupid involved?

As I pondered on this deeply philosophical question, I embarrassingly let myself drift to sleep on the comfy chair of the waiting room.

"Follow me please, the Director is waiting for you in the conference room", the man in a PRT suit said to me while waking me up gently.

I looked up at the clock. Both clock hands were pointing to the ground, meaning that I had napped for 2 hours strait.

I shook my head to wake up entirely. The man was beckoning me to follow him, waving his hands. I stood up, following him into a long corridor. My steps were heavy, but I followed nonetheless.

At the end of the corridor was a large conference room with a single desk. As I entered inside, two figures kept staring at me intently.

I froze. _Oh my god oh my god_ Aegis was here! _The_ Aegis. The hero was standing next to a terrifying overweight woman, in his majestic skin-tight red costume, and frowned as he saw me enter. My muscles were tense, I didn't know what to say, and that woman was increasingly giving the creeps.

After five tense seconds of a staring contest, the woman spoke gravely: "Welcome, I'm Director Piggot from the Brockton Bay PRT, what can I do for you?" She said it with practised ease.

I blinked stupidly, wondering if she'd been told what we were meeting for. "Uhm, I wish to join the Wards", I said, which almost sounded like a question. The seconds stretched as the silence was deafening, and I wondered why I didn't just go into crime and villainy – things would've been so much simpler.

She slightly frowned, her staring eyes becoming glaring. "Obviously. And what is your power? Powers? What is your cape name? I hope you have a better costume than that ridiculous burglar's outfit. And do you have the necessary parental consent?", she shot questions one after the other, leaning more and more with each one. Before I could answer the first one, she added, "This is why you need to follow proper channels. Contact us in advance. You can not, in any circumstances, barge into here like that!"

The parental acceptance signature, I hadn't thought of that. How would that go? 'Hi dad! Sign here, here and here please. It's just to join the Wards team'. Realistically, he probably wouldn't care too much. He never really cared about me. The cape name, I had thought about it a little more. There was already a cape in London called Nature, so that was out of the way, and Beastly sounded way too villainish, so I'd search on the web and found Theron instead, coming from _Pótnia Thêrỗn_, the name given to the recurving motif of the 'Mistress of nature' in very old cultures. Maybe I was overthinking it, but the name sounded good, cool and memorable. Instead of saying all of that, I mumbled, "Sorry ma'am."

As the seconds stretched again, I added a little more confidently, trying to remember the order of questions, "I'm pretty sure I can change into any animal species still alive on earth today, my cape name is Theron, and this is not my final costume."

"Is that it? Animal changer?", she said, sounding almost hopeful. Why would she be hopeful? Did she think having worst powers meant you were a better Ward prospect? After a pause too short to answer anything, she added "Good. Now what about your parents?" She didn't have to be more specific, her shift in body language clearly showing what she meant.

"No, my dad doesn't know, and I was wondering if it could remain that way", I said weakly. I didn't want to talk about mom. _Please don't bring it up. _I mentally crossed my fingers.

Her steel-grey eyes bore into me as she stayed silent. They softened a bit. Just before I added something stupid again, she spoke "It depends on the trigger events. If the parental figure is in any way responsible for the trigger, parental consent isn't necessary. Would you say that your dad caused you to trigger?"

What did that even mean? "Uhm, sorry but what do you mean by trigger event? Is it the time where you get powers?", I guessed.

"Yes", she answered crisply. She added in a softer tone, "Did your dad beat you the day of your trigger? I understand if you do not wish to answer, but it might save you the need to ask for a signature."

"No", I lied. "Nothing like that." I guess he had done some shady stuff that day, but I really had been late, so wasn't it my own fault?

My lie must have been obvious, because she added: "Please tell the truth. It will be better for all of us." She looked intently at Aegis and back at me as she said that.

My voice got caught up into my throat. I wanted to answer that everything was fine. That she was wrong, that my dad was the best dad ever or that I was okay. But I was not okay. My dad had been terrible for my whole damn life, and I needed something to change. "Okay. Yeah, whatever." I tried to sound nonchalant, but this was probably the first time I had ever stood up to my dad. Sure, he wasn't here, so maybe that was cowardice, but better be a coward in the Wards than a brave but useless zoo employee.

She then smiled at me, probably trying to be reassuring but completely failing at it. A smiling shark isn't necessarily a safe shark. "I'll see what can be done.", her smile becoming more real and more mischievous, she added: "follow Aegis, he'll give you the paperwork you need to complete to make it official. There is an NDA you need to sign as well."

We finalized some details, I signed one or two documents, and just after I'd been given a domino mask and Director Piggot had left, Aegis turned towards me and said in a slight South American accent, "Welcome to the Wards. Follow me."

He beckoned me to follow him as we went up in a futuristic elevator and then walked pass a short corridor. At the end of the corridor, there was a sign on a door that said 'Wards Headquarters'. Aegis pressed on a button on the side of the door, waited a few seconds, and entered.

"Oh, and by the way", he said conspiratorially, looking back towards me. "The paperwork can wait. I'll give you a tour." I normally didn't like fellow human being, but this one was nice. Aegis didn't feel like the bullies of Winslow. He sounded more like a 'keep it chill' kind of guy.

"This is the Wards HQ", he said, smiling brightly like the sun. His teeth were cartoonishly white. "There is a gym over there", he said pointing at the other side of the giant room, "and over here to my right there is a small kitchen. You can use it if you are feeling like cooking, but there is the PRT canteen downstairs if you are as lazy as me. To my left over there is the gaming zone, almost exclusively used by Dennis and Chris. Uhm, by that I mean Clockblocker and Kid Win, of course."

Right when he pointed at the big TV screen, surrounded by sofas, a red-haired boy of about my height, roughly 5 feet 9, stood up from one of the sofas and came over to us with a controller in one hand and a grin on his face. He was slim and walked confidently. "If this is not the infamous hooded man! I heard stories about you from Greg at the reception. Apparently, you came in here and you terrified the hearts of everyone with your terrifying attire!" He then came a little closer and gave me his hand to shake. His smile was more mischievous than warm. "I'm Dennis, by the way", he said opening his hand and almost throwing it in mine. As soon as I took it, he disappeared. I looked back and noted that Aegis had teleported as well. That made no sense. If I recalled correctly, no Wards could teleport, even less Aegis and Clockblocker.

"Oh, back in the land of time, I see", Dennis told me from his comfy sofa, with the controller back in his hands. As he paused the game, I realized what had happened. He had used his power to stop me in time, and with the dumb mischievous grin on his face I could tell that he found himself hilarious.

"Excuse him and his manners", Aegis told me as he came back from a desk in the corner to greet me. "I'm Carlos, it's nice to meet you", he said with a warming smile, removing his mask.

"Nice to meet you too", I answered. They both looked back at me as if waiting for me to say something. "Liam", I added reluctantly as I shook Carlos' firm grip – right, he's a brute. I was resistant to give these guys my name, because I didn't know if I could really trust them, but they had given me theirs, so I was partially safe for now. If they revealed my identity, which would make no sense at all, I'd have the possibility to reveal theirs. Essentially, we had a situation of mutually assured destruction.

I was okay with saying my name for now, but I preferred keeping my domino mask. No reason to give them everything on me just yet.

Aegis continued to show me around, firstly passing by the conference rooms and then the Wards' individual rooms. The first one on the right had a medium-sized 'V' centred on the door, which I assumed to be Vista's, the youngest Ward. The one next to it was had a giant poster of Gallant and Glory Girl – Gallant's room – and the furthest was Aegis' room, with the door wide open, showing a neat bed and posters of Legend. On the left side of the corridor was a closed door with a tiny paper on it that said: 'How did the picture end up in jail? It was framed!'. When Aegis realized I'd read that remarkably bad pun, he said: "This is Dennis' room, and like you probably can guess, he puts new puns when he thinks of them. Please don't encourage him too much. He could become an S-class threat". I laughed at the joke. Afterwards, he pointed towards Kid Win's room, with a poster of Hero on it, the first Tinker. Next to Kid Win's room was a door painted completely in black – Shadow Stalker's, by virtue of elimination – and the final one was open. "This will be your room for the time you'll stay here as a Ward. You can personalize it to your liking, and you can do basically anything you want to it. It's too bad that it's the smallest one, and I'm sorry about that, but I'll ask Mis… Vista if she would agree to exchange. She doesn't really care about the size." Right, with her power being able to enhance the size of rooms to ridiculous lengths, a slightly smaller room shouldn't bother her too much. He then added, "I'll ask Piggy if we can enlarge it anyway."

Piggy? _Oh_. I suddenly choked at the nickname. "Piggy? That's what you call Director Piggot?"

"Yeah, well, she is not here, is she?" He said with a playful smirk. I couldn't believe he could disrespect authority like that. And I had a feeling he wasn't the worst in the Wards.

I looked around at the room. The bed was a little small, but I didn't intend to sleep here anyway, and there was a big majestic desk in the corner. That would be awesome to use for research on my new power. During the last week, I had bought and borrowed numerous books on animals at the library, and I now had a huge pile at home. Reading them would not only be helping me at my regular zoologist job, but I'd also pick new potentially useful species I could transform into.

Talking about jobs, now that I had this one with so many new responsibilities, I should probably quit my zookeeping job, even though it hurt my soul just thinking about leaving all the animals I had made true friendly bonds with over the last year.

At that moment, we could hear stomping back at the HQ. A newcomer was talking loudly with Dennis, or Clockblocker as I still called him in my head, with a clearly angry tone to his voice. "…said that she needed a break. A break, again! And then when I asked why, of course she gave the classic 'It's not you, it's me speech', and I couldn't take it anymore. I'll never understand Vicky. One day it's 'love forever', and the next it is 'you're not good enough' and 'you don't listen to me anymore' or whatever. Can you believe it? It's frankly ridiculous." He followed the diatribe with an incoherent groan.

During the newcomer's rant, Carlos and I came back to the sofas. Dennis was brotherly hugging the red-eyed guy and was repeating soothing words to calm the teenager down. I understood that he was Gallant, because he was too tall for Kid Win. Under his mask, Gallant was a broad-shouldered handsome blond man, and wore a suit that screamed 'I am rich'. When he saw me, he unsuccessfully tried to blank his expression, which ended up looking more like a sneer than the intended smile. "Who are you?", his tone almost angry. I guess I was unmasking him forcefully right now.

"I'm a new Ward. Theron, nice to meet you", I said, trying to sound friendly and failing at it. "You must be Gallant?", I asked hastily.

He frowned. "Yes, I am. Call me Dean. So, what can you do?", he asked with a mild patronizing tone. 'He must see himself as a fucking saint, with that cape name', I thought sourly. I never really liked Gallant, as a hero. He was some sort of master. I always hated masters.

"I can transform into any animal species that is not extinct", I answered dryly, the guy starting to really get on my nerves. He really felt right like I thought he would. Arrogant, overconfident. An all-around jerk.

"That's a pretty cool power", he said…sarcastically? I was starting to see red, and I just wanted to show that haughty boy where he stood with a good little punch in the face. I wasn't going to, of course.

My anger must have been showing, because he added, "Hey, calm down. I wasn't sarcastic at all." Yeah, as if. Without skipping a beat, he said: "I'm an empath, if you hadn't heard. That's how I could know you were mad. You didn't really show it." He sounded so full of himself.

Wait, what? He was reading my mind? My _very personal_ mind?! "Stop reading my mind you asshole! Who do you think you are?", I shouted, my heart in my throat.

He stood up and his face scrunched up into an angry expression. His jaw clenched he almost shouted right next to my ears, "I'm not reading your mind, just your emotions! You're just so full of anger I can't even concentrate on the conversation! You're the one with a problem here!" During his tirade, his tall frame started to slowly advance towards me, making me claustrophobic again. I had to leave.

I stormed off towards my room, ignored calls of my name, and slammed the door behind me without looking back. That had gone sour, fast. I could have guessed that he'd be annoying, but I hadn't expected Gallant to be such an asshole.

I took of my shoes and laid on the comfortable bed. In the loneliness of my new bed, I managed after slow breaths to unclench my jaw, and thought about the Wards I had met so far. Sure, Aegis was nice. And when I met Shadow Stalker in my civilian identity, she had saved me from a lot of pain, so she was good in my books, but Dennis was an unfunny dork and Dean was snooty like no other. And he was supposed to be the nice one. Gallant? More like Repellant. I chuckled in my own head.

I could only hope that the two youngest Wards, Vista and Kid Win, wouldn't be as bad.

A few minutes of looking around in my room and thinking later, Carlos knocked and came inside. He was looking less confident than earlier, looking down to his feet. "He didn't mean to sound supercilious, you know? He's a really nice guy most of the time. You're just seeing him at his lowest", he defended. Sure, the guy might have been living a hard day, but his overtly pompous attitude had really struck a nerve. "It's getting late. I'm going home. Don't forget to get here tomorrow at 8:30. We'll do a quick assessment of your capabilities, both powered and unpowered, and Sunday you'll meet with PR and Branding and then the rest of the Wards more officially. Goodbye!"

"Bye", I answered, my heart not really in it. Had I made a mistake coming here? Was it too late to quit? I was sure they wouldn't simply accept that I left the Wards so quickly, because I had some of their identities, and it sure would seem suspicious to quit on the first day. Additionally, I really wanted to meet my savior, the mysterious Shadow Stalker. But first, I had to go back home.

Yesterday, I had found in a book on _The World's 1001 Birds_ that the Common Swift was apparently the fastest horizontal flyer in the world. With it, I reached the house quickly, changed into a tiny fairy fly, one of the smallest insects in the world, to pass through my room's anti-mosquito net, and after a quick shower, went to sleep.


	4. Herbivorous 1,04

**Hi fellow readers. I'm sorry to anounce that I stoped writing this story because I didn't like where it was going nor the presentation of the main character, Liam. I'm currently rewriting this story, with some major differences and some slight ones. However, I had already writen 5 (or 4, not sure) other chapters/the first arc, so I may as well post them/it here. I'd really like some feedback and constructive criticism so that I can improve my writing (english is not my first language) and so that the rewrite can be improved. Have a good read :)**

**1.04**

The next day, I woke up at 6, showered, ate and went back at the Ward's HQ. To get there, I experimented with different insects and birds, trying to be careful not to be seen while I transformed. Diving at speeds of 200 mph as a Peregrine Falcon was exhilarating. I never felt as much alive. As for insects, they were a bit disappointing. Terrible eyesight, mostly no hearing, and their flight speeds were inferior to basically any birds. The only few things they had for themselves were great infiltration capabilities and low inertia, making it possible to change direction extremely easily.

After entering the HQ with my new domino mask and the same horrendous bodysuit as the day before, a PRT officer told me to follow him. He led me towards the PRT gym, where I'd take all the necessary tests. The Wards had another smaller gym like this one where they – we – had privacy.

Entering the gym, I saw an auburn-haired woman standing motionless and staring at a wall. She had an immaculate lab coat, and next to her was a short man in a worn-down lab coat. He saw me enter, said something that I couldn't catch to the women and she turned towards me. "Ah!", she said, beckoning me towards her. "Welcome Theron. We were waiting for you" Her smile reached her eyes, and her colleague – assistant, I guessed – was looking at me like I was a lab rat to be researched on. I guess I was.

During the next half an hour, the PRT officer head of power evaluation in Brockton Bay, "call me Stephanie", asked me numerous questions on the things my power could do. I explained in great details what I had learned since I received my power, and she seemed extremely fascinated by it. Her assistant noted down everything I wrote with mind-numbing speeds.

"So you can't turn into extinct species? What about more recently extinct species? Try the Tasmanian tiger", she ordered with great enthusiasm. I did as was told, and predictably I couldn't turn into the extinct animal, last seen in the mid 20th century. She kept gushing about the fact that my power could tell at any moment if a species had gone extinct.

She kept asking me to change into different species and measured the size of their bodies. Apparently, each time I changed into a new species, the specific size of the body was the size of an average member of that specific species. When I wanted, I could also choose the sex of each species. That was useful, because many animals were not at all the same size as male or female. Finally, I unfortunately couldn't choose the age of the specific animal – it was simply the age of a mature animal, and in some cases, it was in the age of the end of development. That meant that I couldn't turn into a caterpillar, which was annoying but not that bad either. In the case of animals that kept growing for their whole life, she found that my body was the age of an average animal of that species in the wild.

After having weighted all kinds of animals as well, it got a bit more interesting for me. She asked me to go from one point of the room to another, timing precisely my departure as well as my arrival. She explained that it would help her determine the speeds of my animals compared to their speed in the wild. Also, with lighter animals having lower inertia, transforming into all kinds of insects could help me change direction on a whim.

The testing took way longer than expected. She kept asking me to turn into miscellaneous animals, taking samples of venoms and different types of fur that she would test in the PRT laboratory.

Afterwards, we tested my reflexes and other characteristics as animals. The woman didn't stop gushing over the endless study possibilities of my power, and of the information he could learn with me if I wanted to. I was curious as well, but I didn't want to accept any further testing just yet.

The final thing we did relating to my power was to test the damage I retained from different animals. She would cut wool from a sheep, and if I took time to change back to human form and back again, the wool hadn't grown back up. That brought up other questions, which brought others again. Would the wool ever grow back up? Would it grow while I was not transformed? If that was the case, then it would probably never really grow. That would _suck_.

During all that time, while I was concentrated on stretching my figurative muscles, a tall dark-skinned girl entered the gym, wearing a similar mask to my own, and started to work out. When all the power tests were done and Stephanie had given me a few ideas about potentially useful animals, I went to sit peacefully for the short pause until my physical tests. The girl, which had to be Shadow Stalker, turned towards me, examined me from head to toe and asked in a grumpy tone: "New Ward?"

She had the same voice as the girl that saved me. It had to be her. "Yeah, Theron, nice to meet you. You must be Shadow Stalker, I suppose?", I asked, trying to sound nonchalant. Truly, though, I was bubbling with excitement.

"Yeah, whatever", she said, mirroring my tone. Her tone then changed abruptly. "Spar?", she asked eagerly. Her keenness was terrifying. She carried a Machiavellian grin on her face, her head slightly angled towards me, with her amber eyes boring into me. I had a feeling in my gut that she was well versed in the arts of fight. Hell, I had even seen it.

Despite that strange feeling of dread, I accepted the challenge. Strangely, I wasn't terrified, like the numerous times people had ganged up on me. This time, she was a teammate, and a hero, so I knew she'd go easy. Or so I thought.

She walked towards the nearest mat, and I followed, contemplating my terrible life decisions. 'Meh, it will be okay', I tried reassuring myself. She stopped walking a few meters in front of me, and I did as well. I tried to remember everything my dad had thought me. Arms up, bent legs, muscles ready to bolt into action.

The first thing I realized was that she was in a good starting position and had a generally good form, so I knew that I wasn't dealing with a beginner. That made sense, because in the South Docks Shadow Stalker was known for fighting multiple gang members at once and coming out on top. However, that was with powers, and this sparing match would be unpowered. But I didn't want to hurt her. I'd begin slowly and probably amp it up.

"Ready?", she asked. For the first time, I noticed a weird familiarity to her voice. Not familiar from when she protected me. No, it felt older.

At my nod, she started to count down, "3, 2, 1, go!" As soon as that last word was uttered, she came at me so fast I couldn't help but jump in shock. She hit me twice in the stomach, which made me fold in pain, and then she sent another jab on my left shoulder, and the force knocked me to the ground, panting. I really didn't want to stand back up, but I needed to show that I wasn't as bad as it just had seemed. My shoulder was still aching, but I stood back up and took a defensive stance. She started to attack again, but this time I was ready. I parried a left hit, then sidestepped a right kick and messed up the last dodge, where she managed to hit me straight in the chest. It hurt like Butcher's pain inducing power, but I had to keep going. I kept blocking and dodging, managing to defend most of her attacks. She kept increasing pressure, hitting increasingly viciously, as if a burning anger was threatening to explode at any second. About a minute in, she stopped, out of breath. She was red with her fists clenched.

"Why aren't you fucking hitting back, bitch? Are you scared you'll hurt me?", she growled, gritting her teeth in a snarl. "I'll show you what it means to be hurt, asshole!", she said, in the same strangely familiar voice.

I didn't know what to say to that. Sure, I was well versed in fighting techniques, but I just never have been able to use them in offensive ways. When someone attacks me, I don't block and fight back, I generally freeze up and die. When older boys would push me around, instead of fight or flight – or the good reflexes, as my dad call them – I just froze and curled up in a tight ball of flesh. This is a good reflex for mice that doesn't wish to be seen by cats – in bullied boys, not so much. That had notably been the reason why my dad had thought me to fight in the first place.

Unfortunately for me, the threat was forgotten somewhere between my tangled thoughts.

She seemed truly furious, and at once I felt completely trapped. I wouldn't hit back, couldn't just block or dodge and even less leave. Suddenly, she jumped towards me and pushed me hard to the ground. "Hit me back! You hear me? _Hit_. _Me_. _Back_!", she growled angrily. She jumped on me and started hitting me directly in the face with bare hands, and it hurt like hell. Dad never even hit that hard, especially not in the face.

Reflexively, I protected my face with my arms, and pushed her back with my legs in her stomach. I just wanted to show her I wasn't as weak as she made me to be. She was right. I _had_ to hit back.

Resolved, I sprang back up to my feet, blocked her first attack and retorted with a kick of my own. It reached her flank, and I had a horrible feeling that I had hurt her. She seemed unfazed as she started to throw punch after punch which such vigor that I couldn't block everything. I ducked under her onslaught and hit her back with my own punch straight into her solar plexus. She double over, but before I could capitalize on it, she jumped back headfirst into my stomach. In the next instant, I was down on the ground, hands behind my back and I knew that any movement would hurt tremendously. After a few tense seconds, I capitulated, and she let me go.

"Again?", she asked, apparently unhurt. She had one of these grins that could be interpreted as happiness in some contexts and craziness in others. Terrifying.

After a short countdown, we exploded back into action, this round going slightly better than the last. She was ridiculously good, and even with an inch on her and a few pounds, she kept toying with me as if I was a beginner. As the second round ended, I had bruises all over, but the fight had been truly fun, despite my prior terror.

"Not bad. You're terrible, but still way better than some of the other dunderheads", she said as she let me go from her iron grip. "If you want to do this again, ask", she said casually as if we just had a cup of tea. She unceremoniously walked away, and I couldn't believe how exhilarating that had been.

This probably had been the most fun I had in a long time. She was extremely good, fast and confident in every action she took. Wow.

Looking around after her departure, I realized that we hadn't been alone. A few PRT officers had come to watch the sparing match. That was embarrassing. As I saw someone in a white costume riddled with clocks, I realized that I must have said that last part aloud, because Dennis – or Clockblocker, in costume – stood up and started to applaud. "Wow indeed", he exclaimed. Turning towards the closest PRT officer, he whispered conspiratorially and loud enough for everyone to hear: "Remember me what just happened if I ever accept to fight him." People laughed, and I blushed hard under my mask.

Apparently, what I just did was impressive? I guess Clockblocker had not much reason to learn hand to hand combat properly, with him being a Striker, but the other Wards had to be somewhat competent. The way Shadow Stalker had said it, she really didn't respect their skills.

Also, she had said that if I'd want to spar again, I'd simply had to ask. I'd take her up on that.

After the fight, I had a bit of time to eat, and then I went back to the same gym for the fitness evaluation.


	5. Herbivorous 1,05

**Hi. This is the final chapter of the story. :( I still hope that this cape fight (spoiler sorry :/ ) will open your eyes to the awesomeness of this power :) . To the people that pointed out how dumb Liam has been at multiple times, I agree, and it's in part why I'm rewriting the story presently.**

**PS: there is twice the views in this chapter than the last, which is weird. If you haven't read the previous chapter it is recommended to do so before this one.**

**1.06**

"Hey. Ready to get cut to ribbons?", the dark figure said on a mat in the gym. She already stood in a fighting stance, as if she had been waiting there. She was in her full black cloak, with her dark-grey metal mask. Her overall demeanor was terrifying. Even if I was slightly taller and had a bigger frame, I knew that her skill made her outright unbeatable. Not to count powers as well.

"Err… Hi. Yeah, I guess", I said. "I guess that I'm ready, of course. Not to get cut", I hastily added. And now I was making a fool of myself. I really wished I would stop to act such like an idiot around this girl. She just had a way to wreck my brain.

She seemed ready to go at any second. My breath sped up and my hands started shaking. I wasn't going to die. I was going to be fine. Anything I said to myself wasn't going to be enough.

She stared at me intently. "Are you going to have a mental breakdown or what? We can start with normal sparing if you're too much of a pussy to use your power", she said angrily.

I was glad she proposed that, even if it probably sarcastic. "Yeah, please", I said quietly.

She tilted her head as she glared at me. I went on the mat, and she started counting down.

Contrary to yesterday, I was ready to fight, not just defend. I was more confident today, and it showed for the first few seconds. I blocked and parried, giving her a hard time as I launched blow after blow, kick to the side and punch at the face. After sharing a few blows, she took two steps back to composed herself, and then jumped back towards me to start the assault again.

This time it was more vicious. Brutish even. Some of the kicks were blocked. Most were too fast and connected.

After what felt like an eternity, she jumped at my waist and knocked me to the ground. I rarely had this much fun. I rarely let myself loose, more like never actually, but I knew that now that I had felt it, the exhilarating force of freedom, I wouldn't be able to let myself get free from it. If that made any sense.

As she let me go and took the first round, I thought that I might finally be able to do it. Fighting wasn't so bad after all, was it? Our powers weren't the destructive types, like the ones of Legend, or even Mass. Mass was a villain from the South of the United States, A-class. He could change at will the mass of any of his body parts, and in turn they would become more resistant. He could kind of fly by punching his non heavy fists in the air and making them go to ridiculous weights. That would let him propel himself, as his body followed, into walls and he wouldn't get even a little scratch.

She got me out of my musing with a bored tone. "Ready to fight like real Parahumans now? Not going to shit your pants, are you?", she taunted.

I had to think about this. I should have thought about it before, really. What were the best animals to use? Should I stay as a bear-like brute and keep swallowing punches without risking getting really hurt? Or should I become small animals, like birds or insects, to avoid her strikes? As I pondered this, I swallowed hard at the lump in my throat, and acquiesced.

As she started to count down, I changed in all the animals I could think of, as fast as I could, to get myself into the mindset of the fight. Lion, tiger, snake, gorilla, bear, bull, cheetah, and back to lion. As I changed as fast as I could, every tenth of a second or so, she stopped counting and looked at me wide eyed, as if she had never seen a Parahuman power before. Shaking her head out of her reverie, she started counting again. At the zero mark, she promptly disappeared. I didn't have time to be terrified. As I looked around to see where she was, a knuckle smashed on my left arm, hurting like a gunshot. I couldn't see her because of a combination of her bullshit power and graceful speed. I got hit another time, hard, and was down on the ground, panting. Dennis wasn't lying. Without power, she was fast. With it, she was something else. A combination of ruthlessness, grace, and undeniable skill made her of a force to be reckoned with. I stood back up slowly and spun around, thinking I had heard something. No one was behind me. I heard a soft voice behind my ears, singsongingly saying, "don't forget to use your power."

Oh. Duh. It was a power match, after all, and I hadn't used them yet.

I thought that a gorilla would make a good tank. Indeed, as her assault started back, it felt like we were at a stalemate. She would hit me repeatedly, but her hits wouldn't hurt badly at all. I was swinging my hands randomly, hoping I would reach her luckily, but that was not to be. Unfortunately for me, she was smart, and started to hit me at place which truly hurt. She'd jump way higher than should have been possible and sent her feet directly into my strong gorilla jaw. Even a gorilla could get hurt apparently. I had to play smart as well.

When I saw her from the corner of my eyes, jumping towards me again. I swiftly changed into a hummingbird to change direction and faced her as I changed into a Kodiak bear. Kodiak bears were gigantic bears that could reach weights up to 1500 pounds. As she kept going at me, I waited for the impact that never came. She had gone right through me, and I had to use the same hummingbird trick to turn fast and face her. She raged incoherently, as she rushed at me once again. On reflex, I turned into a porcupine at the last possible second, and without having time to react she ran right into me. She changed as fast as she could into her shadow state, and I felt a few of my quills simply disappear.

I turned back fast again. She was pissed. That much was clear. Her fists were clenched, her stance was murderous, and her glare could have torched me. Luckily, none of my quills had implanted into her skin, most of it having only scratched her costume. I changed into a parrot, and taunted in a squawky parrot voice, "Not so invincible now, are you?" Then, I changed into a lama, and spit directly towards her face. She shadowed through it, but the message was still clear.

I would never have taunted her like that, but I felt so untouchable, so powerful, that I felt like I had nothing to fear. I felt truly like an unstoppable force, and her attacks where doing basically nothing against my strong animals. She took me out of my daydream, shouting: "I. Don't. Loose!" She then added in a soft tone that chilled me to my bones and cured me from my false impression of invincibility, "Wait and see." With that, she was gone from view.

Had she left? Abandoned? Surely not. Right? I looked around turning again into a small bird. I chose bee hummingbirds to turn around on myself because they could turn fast while still maintaining normal senses. I could have turned into all kinds of insects, sure, and they could turn around fast, but their vision and hearing were wonky. When I turned around, I realized that I really couldn't see her. Even worse, the lights went dark. I couldn't see anything, the red exit signs in the far corner of the gym was the only light illuminating the room.

Next thing I knew, I had a pointy arrow slightly scratch into my right wing. Did she just try to kill me? A centimeter to the left and I was truly dead! It hurt like hell, and with the hummingbirds roughly 1200 beats per minute heart, I knew I had to change animals. Quantities that felt like litres were pouring out of the side of my damaged wing. Fast. I changed into a Kodiak bear, and strangely the agony lessened. No more blood, and the pain was basically nonexistent. Even more strangely, as I changed back into the bee hummingbird, I felt the same pain in the same place. Blood started draining from my miniscule veins once again. Thinking of myself as a little genius, I change swiftly into another species of hummingbird. _Anthracothorax_ nigricollis, I remembered from a book on birds, slightly bigger hummingbird this time. I was thinking the damage would go away, like it mostly had for the bear. To my astonishment, the agony was just as bad.

I didn't understand. What the hell? How did this make any sense whatsoever? The Kodiak bear didn't maintain the damage because it wasn't the same species, right? So, a different species of hummingbirds should work similarly, or so I thought. Not having time to solve this mystery, I changed back into the safeness of the enormous bear I had learned to love.

I still had a problem, though. I couldn't see anything, and she had piercing arrows. Not to add insult to injury, but she was basically invisible in that darkness. What could I do? Owls could see well in the dark, but as I tried, the pain assaulted me again in the same right wing, slightly lesser this time. However, I didn't have time to cherish the small victory. Moreover, the vision of an owl was good, but she was still invisible.

I had a flash of genius. Pit vipers could see using infrared light. If I changed into one, the heat-seeing organ might catch her even with her power active. I had to try.

I changed into the said pit viper. She was right in front of me apparently using her power, because the image was blurry, and she was way too cold to be in a normal human being state. She was tiptoeing to the other side of the room taking out another arrow. Luckily, I didn't think she knew where I was. Her crossbow wasn't pointed directly at me, and the blob that was her face was moving left and right. I slowly crawled closer, without making any sound.

When I was about two meters away, she changed back for instant back of her shadowy form. I took advantage of the situation jumping as a snake and changing mid-air into a kangaroo. Kangaroos are notorious for kicking and punching, and I certainly had my little test subject. How had my thoughts taken such a hard turn so fast? A few days ago, I couldn't defend myself if my life depended on it, and now I wanted to hurt another human being? Something was wrong with me.

Anyways, I almost flew towards her, speed having been acquired by the snake, and the mass of the beast ran into her. Again, she didn't have time to change into her shadow state, and the kick made her lift of her feet and land hard on the floor.

As she fell to the ground, gilt came back to me in full force. Had I hurt her? I hoped not. I turned into a majestic lion, and the gilt went away. I was the best. I deserved to win. If she was hurt, so what? She'd learn not to fuck with me next time.

Unfortunately, she stood back up. She shadowed back and opened the lights. "How the hell did you do that? I was fucking invisible, you dipshit", she shouted at the form of my now friendly dog (dog smell was awesome).

"Err, well a certain type of snake can see infrared, so… yeah, sorry", I answered as I changed back into my familiar human form. I didn't know why I was apologising. She had shot a real arrow from a too real crossbow right at me! It could have been way worst than it was! I hastily added, "And what the hell was that? Piercing arrows? Really?"

She looked at me strangely, slightly shifting her head on the side. "Ok, yeah, you're right. Rematch?" She said that casually as she dropped her crossbows to her side.

"Yeah", I answered. As soon as I did, she jumped back towards me, almost invisible even with the powerfully shining lights of the gymnasium. She punched left, right, right again, and with each assault I changed into different animals, first parrying with the strength of a gorilla arm, then dodging as a fly, changing back into myself once again. Again, it was strange that the fly wasn't hurt at all but all birds I had tried still were. The fighting felt like a choreographed dance, her attacking viciously and me defending gracefully, then we would change roles and a grasshopper would jump towards her and I would change into a bigger animal. Anytime I did that little trick, she would evade the attack entirely in her shadow state.

The sparing kept going for what felt like hours, but was just over a minute, and I was starting to get exhausted. She clearly had better cardio than I had, so I had to find ways to win the fight. A right fist the size of my whole hamster body cut me out of my reverie, and it made me stumble back as I changed into a big polar bear to catch myself. She immediately followed with a kick in the white-furred stomach, which hurt like hell and made me fold in pain. Yeah, apparently even a 1500 pounds beast could get hurt by a well-placed kick. As she tried the same tactic, I reflexively changed into a turtle to take the hit, and even if it connected, I was pretty sure it hurt her more that it did to me. I still flew through the air after the impact, sliding onto the ground for a few meters like a curling stone on ice.

As I materialized back into a small snake to become aware of my environment, I felt a hand grab at my head. I changed quickly into a smaller snake, trying to get out of her iron grip, but she just kept closing harder. It was seriously starting to hurt, so I changed into a wasp. As I did so, she was still around me. I changed my form at the head, so she simply had to close her two hands on my fragile body, and I was locked.

I reflexively stung her hand, which must have stung badly, because the next second I was free. I didn't have time to ponder on my newly acquired freedom, that a now glove-covered hand fell on me again.

Hmm… strange… I couldn't change into anything much bigger. I was locked into my minuscule prison, unable to move and only able to metamorphose into a smaller insect. I felt myself move, and heard what felt like sounds, but my terrible fly senses couldn't understand any of it. After what felt like an eternity in the tiny quickly heating jail, I saw light once again. I had only the place to change into a small rat now, and so I did.

I looked around. My prison was now a small plastic box. Her huge body was looking down to my small one. She was probably monologuing before I changed, because I just had time to hear "… why you shouldn't fuck with me, bitch. You can now really see who the real predator is! I win. You lose!" A part of my brain was screaming something, but the rest of it couldn't hear it.

Her voice had a bone-chilling feel to it. My rat heart was pounding at 500 beats a minute. Could rats have heart attacks? I hoped not, or I was probably going to die.

She was still standing there, and I squealed, hoping that she would understand my plea for freedom. "What you sayin' you little shit?", she said in a rough voice. "You see, in life, there is the winners and the losers. Will you fight, or will you flee? Are you a survivor, or a victim? Will you fight for what you want?", she asked with upmost confidence. Absolutely bonkers.

Was I a victim? If you'd asked me a month ago, the question would have been hard to hide. Now though? I could be both, being the king of the jungle one second and the fleeing rat the next. Did that make me a predator, prey or both?

I changed into the smallest pygmy parrot species I remembered, the buff-faced pygmy parrot, and answered, "Let me show you right now. Final rematch to break the tie?"

She looked down at my pathetic form for a few seconds. Sighing, she straightened up and answered, "Alright, tie-breaker." She said it with such finality that even Eidolon wouldn't be able to change her mind. "But you won't win", she said. "Go", she shouted out of the blue, and the fight started back in earnest.

She was even more unforgiving than before. She started pushing hard, kicking at the knee of a tiger, then pushing my dog form out of the air, and before I landed, kicking my unsuspecting armadillo. I was losing, and I couldn't let myself fall into the same dance that tired me out last time. I had to find a way to fight her back. There must be a way, right? 2 million species. Two million possible choices.

I changed into Kodiak bear again, to get time to relax, but she didn't have the same plan in mind. She jumped right through my torso, and as she materialized back, she swiftly changed directions towards the back of my bear. I didn't have time to react, so she hit me harder than expected. I turned as fast as I could, trying to face her again. I took a step towards her, trying to reach her with my kangaroo punches. She kept blinking in and out of her breaker state, escaping all my attacks. Was she taunting me?

I was starting to get seriously pissed of by her taunts. I kept hitting nothing, and she was laughing at me. A strangely melodic laugh.

I shook my head, getting stray thoughts out of my mind. How could I beat her? How could I even touch her? Maybe she'd tire out faster than me? Unlikely.

I tried remembering what Clockblocker had said to me earlier today. What was her weakness again? Electricity, right, nothing to do about that...

Wait a second. There were countless animals that used electricity to find preys, communicate, and hurt opponents. Electric catfish, electric rays, electric eels – all sorts of animals had electric properties, and some could even send electric shocks, stored in special battery-like organs! If she went through an electric eel, would she go right through, or get the full extent of the shock?

As I pondered this, I kept punching in the void of shadow, and she kept moving, sidestepping, and overall escaping my attacks. I had a plan, and I would follow it.

I punched her hard one last time, and she blinked out, thinking I'd do the same as before. Instead, I kept going, and as she passed through me, my body materialized into an electric eel, sending into her body a slightly higher dose of electricity than necessary. The 500 volts I sent were enough to lock her muscles for a fraction of a second. I changed back into my human form, and she slowly stood up. My taser-like attack had worked a little too well, and now she seemed a little bit shocked (ha!).

After she was back to normal, we congratulated each other for the good match. She kept specifying that she won despite the lack of evidence, but I wouldn't fight her over it. Whoever won, it had been awesome, and I wanted, or _needed_, to do this again.

**AN: I've been told that Liam doesn't think of ways to use his power in extremely destructive ways. It's true, because he doesn't think of hurting people with his power (yet :) ), and I think it's consistent with his personnality. I'd like to add that I've spent multiple dozens of hours thinking and researching on novel ways to use his power in offensive ways. Again, it wouldn't make sense if he had all my knowledge. For now, he thinks of practical, and peaceful ways to use his power.**

**Anyway, that's all for this story, but I'll be writing other stuff in the future.**


	6. Herbivorous 1,06

**Hi. This is the final chapter of the story. :( I still hope that this cape fight (spoiler sorry :/ ) will open your eyes to the awesomeness of this power :) . To the people that pointed out how dumb Liam has been at multiple times, I agree, and it's in part why I'm rewriting the story presently.**

**PS: there is twice the views in this chapter than the last, which is weird. If you haven't read the previous chapter it is recommended to do so before this one.**

**1.06**

"Hey. Ready to get cut to ribbons?", the dark figure said on a mat in the gym. She already stood in a fighting stance, as if she had been waiting there. She was in her full black cloak, with her dark-grey metal mask. Her overall demeanor was terrifying. Even if I was slightly taller and had a bigger frame, I knew that her skill made her outright unbeatable. Not to count powers as well.

"Err… Hi. Yeah, I guess", I said. "I guess that I'm ready, of course. Not to get cut", I hastily added. And now I was making a fool of myself. I really wished I would stop to act such like an idiot around this girl. She just had a way to wreck my brain.

She seemed ready to go at any second. My breath sped up and my hands started shaking. I wasn't going to die. I was going to be fine. Anything I said to myself wasn't going to be enough.

She stared at me intently. "Are you going to have a mental breakdown or what? We can start with normal sparing if you're too much of a pussy to use your power", she said angrily.

I was glad she proposed that, even if it probably sarcastic. "Yeah, please", I said quietly.

She tilted her head as she glared at me. I went on the mat, and she started counting down.

Contrary to yesterday, I was ready to fight, not just defend. I was more confident today, and it showed for the first few seconds. I blocked and parried, giving her a hard time as I launched blow after blow, kick to the side and punch at the face. After sharing a few blows, she took two steps back to composed herself, and then jumped back towards me to start the assault again.

This time it was more vicious. Brutish even. Some of the kicks were blocked. Most were too fast and connected.

After what felt like an eternity, she jumped at my waist and knocked me to the ground. I rarely had this much fun. I rarely let myself loose, more like never actually, but I knew that now that I had felt it, the exhilarating force of freedom, I wouldn't be able to let myself get free from it. If that made any sense.

As she let me go and took the first round, I thought that I might finally be able to do it. Fighting wasn't so bad after all, was it? Our powers weren't the destructive types, like the ones of Legend, or even Mass. Mass was a villain from the South of the United States, A-class. He could change at will the mass of any of his body parts, and in turn they would become more resistant. He could kind of fly by punching his non heavy fists in the air and making them go to ridiculous weights. That would let him propel himself, as his body followed, into walls and he wouldn't get even a little scratch.

She got me out of my musing with a bored tone. "Ready to fight like real Parahumans now? Not going to shit your pants, are you?", she taunted.

I had to think about this. I should have thought about it before, really. What were the best animals to use? Should I stay as a bear-like brute and keep swallowing punches without risking getting really hurt? Or should I become small animals, like birds or insects, to avoid her strikes? As I pondered this, I swallowed hard at the lump in my throat, and acquiesced.

As she started to count down, I changed in all the animals I could think of, as fast as I could, to get myself into the mindset of the fight. Lion, tiger, snake, gorilla, bear, bull, cheetah, and back to lion. As I changed as fast as I could, every tenth of a second or so, she stopped counting and looked at me wide eyed, as if she had never seen a Parahuman power before. Shaking her head out of her reverie, she started counting again. At the zero mark, she promptly disappeared. I didn't have time to be terrified. As I looked around to see where she was, a knuckle smashed on my left arm, hurting like a gunshot. I couldn't see her because of a combination of her bullshit power and graceful speed. I got hit another time, hard, and was down on the ground, panting. Dennis wasn't lying. Without power, she was fast. With it, she was something else. A combination of ruthlessness, grace, and undeniable skill made her of a force to be reckoned with. I stood back up slowly and spun around, thinking I had heard something. No one was behind me. I heard a soft voice behind my ears, singsongingly saying, "don't forget to use your power."

Oh. Duh. It was a power match, after all, and I hadn't used them yet.

I thought that a gorilla would make a good tank. Indeed, as her assault started back, it felt like we were at a stalemate. She would hit me repeatedly, but her hits wouldn't hurt badly at all. I was swinging my hands randomly, hoping I would reach her luckily, but that was not to be. Unfortunately for me, she was smart, and started to hit me at place which truly hurt. She'd jump way higher than should have been possible and sent her feet directly into my strong gorilla jaw. Even a gorilla could get hurt apparently. I had to play smart as well.

When I saw her from the corner of my eyes, jumping towards me again. I swiftly changed into a hummingbird to change direction and faced her as I changed into a Kodiak bear. Kodiak bears were gigantic bears that could reach weights up to 1500 pounds. As she kept going at me, I waited for the impact that never came. She had gone right through me, and I had to use the same hummingbird trick to turn fast and face her. She raged incoherently, as she rushed at me once again. On reflex, I turned into a porcupine at the last possible second, and without having time to react she ran right into me. She changed as fast as she could into her shadow state, and I felt a few of my quills simply disappear.

I turned back fast again. She was pissed. That much was clear. Her fists were clenched, her stance was murderous, and her glare could have torched me. Luckily, none of my quills had implanted into her skin, most of it having only scratched her costume. I changed into a parrot, and taunted in a squawky parrot voice, "Not so invincible now, are you?" Then, I changed into a lama, and spit directly towards her face. She shadowed through it, but the message was still clear.

I would never have taunted her like that, but I felt so untouchable, so powerful, that I felt like I had nothing to fear. I felt truly like an unstoppable force, and her attacks where doing basically nothing against my strong animals. She took me out of my daydream, shouting: "I. Don't. Loose!" She then added in a soft tone that chilled me to my bones and cured me from my false impression of invincibility, "Wait and see." With that, she was gone from view.

Had she left? Abandoned? Surely not. Right? I looked around turning again into a small bird. I chose bee hummingbirds to turn around on myself because they could turn fast while still maintaining normal senses. I could have turned into all kinds of insects, sure, and they could turn around fast, but their vision and hearing were wonky. When I turned around, I realized that I really couldn't see her. Even worse, the lights went dark. I couldn't see anything, the red exit signs in the far corner of the gym was the only light illuminating the room.

Next thing I knew, I had a pointy arrow slightly scratch into my right wing. Did she just try to kill me? A centimeter to the left and I was truly dead! It hurt like hell, and with the hummingbirds roughly 1200 beats per minute heart, I knew I had to change animals. Quantities that felt like litres were pouring out of the side of my damaged wing. Fast. I changed into a Kodiak bear, and strangely the agony lessened. No more blood, and the pain was basically nonexistent. Even more strangely, as I changed back into the bee hummingbird, I felt the same pain in the same place. Blood started draining from my miniscule veins once again. Thinking of myself as a little genius, I change swiftly into another species of hummingbird. _Anthracothorax_ nigricollis, I remembered from a book on birds, slightly bigger hummingbird this time. I was thinking the damage would go away, like it mostly had for the bear. To my astonishment, the agony was just as bad.

I didn't understand. What the hell? How did this make any sense whatsoever? The Kodiak bear didn't maintain the damage because it wasn't the same species, right? So, a different species of hummingbirds should work similarly, or so I thought. Not having time to solve this mystery, I changed back into the safeness of the enormous bear I had learned to love.

I still had a problem, though. I couldn't see anything, and she had piercing arrows. Not to add insult to injury, but she was basically invisible in that darkness. What could I do? Owls could see well in the dark, but as I tried, the pain assaulted me again in the same right wing, slightly lesser this time. However, I didn't have time to cherish the small victory. Moreover, the vision of an owl was good, but she was still invisible.

I had a flash of genius. Pit vipers could see using infrared light. If I changed into one, the heat-seeing organ might catch her even with her power active. I had to try.

I changed into the said pit viper. She was right in front of me apparently using her power, because the image was blurry, and she was way too cold to be in a normal human being state. She was tiptoeing to the other side of the room taking out another arrow. Luckily, I didn't think she knew where I was. Her crossbow wasn't pointed directly at me, and the blob that was her face was moving left and right. I slowly crawled closer, without making any sound.

When I was about two meters away, she changed back for instant back of her shadowy form. I took advantage of the situation jumping as a snake and changing mid-air into a kangaroo. Kangaroos are notorious for kicking and punching, and I certainly had my little test subject. How had my thoughts taken such a hard turn so fast? A few days ago, I couldn't defend myself if my life depended on it, and now I wanted to hurt another human being? Something was wrong with me.

Anyways, I almost flew towards her, speed having been acquired by the snake, and the mass of the beast ran into her. Again, she didn't have time to change into her shadow state, and the kick made her lift of her feet and land hard on the floor.

As she fell to the ground, gilt came back to me in full force. Had I hurt her? I hoped not. I turned into a majestic lion, and the gilt went away. I was the best. I deserved to win. If she was hurt, so what? She'd learn not to fuck with me next time.

Unfortunately, she stood back up. She shadowed back and opened the lights. "How the hell did you do that? I was fucking invisible, you dipshit", she shouted at the form of my now friendly dog (dog smell was awesome).

"Err, well a certain type of snake can see infrared, so… yeah, sorry", I answered as I changed back into my familiar human form. I didn't know why I was apologising. She had shot a real arrow from a too real crossbow right at me! It could have been way worst than it was! I hastily added, "And what the hell was that? Piercing arrows? Really?"

She looked at me strangely, slightly shifting her head on the side. "Ok, yeah, you're right. Rematch?" She said that casually as she dropped her crossbows to her side.

"Yeah", I answered. As soon as I did, she jumped back towards me, almost invisible even with the powerfully shining lights of the gymnasium. She punched left, right, right again, and with each assault I changed into different animals, first parrying with the strength of a gorilla arm, then dodging as a fly, changing back into myself once again. Again, it was strange that the fly wasn't hurt at all but all birds I had tried still were. The fighting felt like a choreographed dance, her attacking viciously and me defending gracefully, then we would change roles and a grasshopper would jump towards her and I would change into a bigger animal. Anytime I did that little trick, she would evade the attack entirely in her shadow state.

The sparing kept going for what felt like hours, but was just over a minute, and I was starting to get exhausted. She clearly had better cardio than I had, so I had to find ways to win the fight. A right fist the size of my whole hamster body cut me out of my reverie, and it made me stumble back as I changed into a big polar bear to catch myself. She immediately followed with a kick in the white-furred stomach, which hurt like hell and made me fold in pain. Yeah, apparently even a 1500 pounds beast could get hurt by a well-placed kick. As she tried the same tactic, I reflexively changed into a turtle to take the hit, and even if it connected, I was pretty sure it hurt her more that it did to me. I still flew through the air after the impact, sliding onto the ground for a few meters like a curling stone on ice.

As I materialized back into a small snake to become aware of my environment, I felt a hand grab at my head. I changed quickly into a smaller snake, trying to get out of her iron grip, but she just kept closing harder. It was seriously starting to hurt, so I changed into a wasp. As I did so, she was still around me. I changed my form at the head, so she simply had to close her two hands on my fragile body, and I was locked.

I reflexively stung her hand, which must have stung badly, because the next second I was free. I didn't have time to ponder on my newly acquired freedom, that a now glove-covered hand fell on me again.

Hmm… strange… I couldn't change into anything much bigger. I was locked into my minuscule prison, unable to move and only able to metamorphose into a smaller insect. I felt myself move, and heard what felt like sounds, but my terrible fly senses couldn't understand any of it. After what felt like an eternity in the tiny quickly heating jail, I saw light once again. I had only the place to change into a small rat now, and so I did.

I looked around. My prison was now a small plastic box. Her huge body was looking down to my small one. She was probably monologuing before I changed, because I just had time to hear "… why you shouldn't fuck with me, bitch. You can now really see who the real predator is! I win. You lose!" A part of my brain was screaming something, but the rest of it couldn't hear it.

Her voice had a bone-chilling feel to it. My rat heart was pounding at 500 beats a minute. Could rats have heart attacks? I hoped not, or I was probably going to die.

She was still standing there, and I squealed, hoping that she would understand my plea for freedom. "What you sayin' you little shit?", she said in a rough voice. "You see, in life, there is the winners and the losers. Will you fight, or will you flee? Are you a survivor, or a victim? Will you fight for what you want?", she asked with upmost confidence. Absolutely bonkers.

Was I a victim? If you'd asked me a month ago, the question would have been hard to hide. Now though? I could be both, being the king of the jungle one second and the fleeing rat the next. Did that make me a predator, prey or both?

I changed into the smallest pygmy parrot species I remembered, the buff-faced pygmy parrot, and answered, "Let me show you right now. Final rematch to break the tie?"

She looked down at my pathetic form for a few seconds. Sighing, she straightened up and answered, "Alright, tie-breaker." She said it with such finality that even Eidolon wouldn't be able to change her mind. "But you won't win", she said. "Go", she shouted out of the blue, and the fight started back in earnest.

She was even more unforgiving than before. She started pushing hard, kicking at the knee of a tiger, then pushing my dog form out of the air, and before I landed, kicking my unsuspecting armadillo. I was losing, and I couldn't let myself fall into the same dance that tired me out last time. I had to find a way to fight her back. There must be a way, right? 2 million species. Two million possible choices.

I changed into Kodiak bear again, to get time to relax, but she didn't have the same plan in mind. She jumped right through my torso, and as she materialized back, she swiftly changed directions towards the back of my bear. I didn't have time to react, so she hit me harder than expected. I turned as fast as I could, trying to face her again. I took a step towards her, trying to reach her with my kangaroo punches. She kept blinking in and out of her breaker state, escaping all my attacks. Was she taunting me?

I was starting to get seriously pissed of by her taunts. I kept hitting nothing, and she was laughing at me. A strangely melodic laugh.

I shook my head, getting stray thoughts out of my mind. How could I beat her? How could I even touch her? Maybe she'd tire out faster than me? Unlikely.

I tried remembering what Clockblocker had said to me earlier today. What was her weakness again? Electricity, right, nothing to do about that...

Wait a second. There were countless animals that used electricity to find preys, communicate, and hurt opponents. Electric catfish, electric rays, electric eels – all sorts of animals had electric properties, and some could even send electric shocks, stored in special battery-like organs! If she went through an electric eel, would she go right through, or get the full extent of the shock?

As I pondered this, I kept punching in the void of shadow, and she kept moving, sidestepping, and overall escaping my attacks. I had a plan, and I would follow it.

I punched her hard one last time, and she blinked out, thinking I'd do the same as before. Instead, I kept going, and as she passed through me, my body materialized into an electric eel, sending into her body a slightly higher dose of electricity than necessary. The 500 volts I sent were enough to lock her muscles for a fraction of a second. I changed back into my human form, and she slowly stood up. My taser-like attack had worked a little too well, and now she seemed a little bit shocked (ha!).

After she was back to normal, we congratulated each other for the good match. She kept specifying that she won despite the lack of evidence, but I wouldn't fight her over it. Whoever won, it had been awesome, and I wanted, or _needed_, to do this again.

**AN: I've been told that Liam doesn't think of ways to use his power in extremely destructive ways. It's true, because he doesn't think of hurting people with his power (yet :) ), and I think it's consistent with his personnality. I'd like to add that I've spent multiple dozens of hours thinking and researching on novel ways to use his power in offensive ways. Again, it wouldn't make sense if he had all my knowledge. For now, he thinks of practical, and peaceful ways to use his power.**

**Anyway, that's all for this story, but I'll be writing other stuff in the future.**


End file.
